CHROME BLOUSE

We are in a time now
once unfathomable to our elders.
Slick umber dirt-sacks brighten the landscape.
Jars of peanut butter - once so common
have become sacred myth,
and we try not to do anything dangerous
without our capes on.

The Avon Zeppelin hovers above beaches
within shouting distance,
pummeling us with lipstick samples
and eyeliner suggestions.
We explode with laughter
in our sickening wigs,
interrupting the conversations of
nearby vacationing Finns.

We used to pray to the Tattooed Baby
who lived behind Donut King.
He supplied our patches
and read our destinies in clipped leather syllables
and soothing refrain.
Then Grandmother was found dead in the attic
curled up in a nest of more than
a thousand crumpled grocery lists.

Soon it will not be necessary to speak.
Ceremonious syntax is being tapped out
in html by dampened limbs
too weak to silence the muffled tomes
of your thick, insulated clocks.